Still from Songs of Slow Burning Earth, a Critical Issues Fund grantee
Still from Songs of Slow Burning Earth
Program
Critical Issues Fund

The Critical Issues Fund supported filmmakers, with more than $250,000 in funding, whose work is focused on important and topical issues that are currently having a decided and material impact on communities domestically and internationally. The 2022 program awarded grants to twelve films which explore some of the most pressing issues of the moment: the war in Ukraine, gun violence, reproductive justice, and climate emergencies.

Read our full announcement of the program grantees here.

Explore the 12 grantees below:

Current cohort
Monica Simpson, Executive Director of SisterSong, speaking at a press conference after the first day of the SisterSong v Georgia trial. She is directly facing the camera and is wearing hoop earrings and a black blouse with gold polka dots.
After Roe (working title)
Production still from After Roe
Still from Breaking the News Film. Editor-at-large Errin Haines is smiling directly at the camera in a pink sweatshirt that reads "Represent."
Breaking The News
Still from Breaking The News
Still from Displaced. A main railway station in Kyiv, Ukraine during the first days of war. A crowd of people, who are attempting to get on an overcrowded train and evacuate the city, fills the photo. A man in profile to the camera extending his arm can be seen in the middle.
Songs of Slow Burning Earth
Still from Displaced
Still from My Dear Theo. We see soldiers sitting on the ground on the edge of a trench. We see only their backs as they are looking towards pink, evening sky. Only one of the soldiers is standing up, observing the horizon.
My Dear Theo
Still from My Dear Theo, Photo: Alisa Kovalenko
Still from Hollywood Does Abortion. Montage of color images from the films and television shows that will be discussed in the documentary. There are four rows of images, with seven to eight images in each row.
Hollywood Does Abortion
Still from Hollywood Does Abortion
Production still of Intercepted. A ransacked classroom in a school near Mikholaiv is shown. Blue and yellow cloths are hanging from the ceiling, a light fixture is hanging from the ceiling by a thread. The classroom door is wide open and wind is blowing from the destroyed windows
Intercepted
Production still from Intercepted, Photo: Christopher Nunn
PLAN C strategy meeting 2021. A group of people gathers around a table with plates and drinks while a person writes on a whiteboard.
Plan C
Still from Plan C
Main still from Razing Liberty Square
Razing Liberty Square
Still from Razing Liberty Square
Still from Sol in the Garden. A woman in profile to the camera is inside a greenhouse, touching the leaves of a guava tree.
Sol in the Garden
Still from Sol in the Garden
Baby Doe
Uvalde Mom
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